The present invention relates to dispensers with which lengths of sheet materials may be manually dispensed from supplies of the sheet materials carried on the dispensers, which dispensers include cutting members having sharp cutting edges adapted for transversely cutting dispensed lengths of the sheet materials from the sheet materials remaining on the dispensers, and include means for protecting users of the dispensers from contact with the sharp cutting edges between their uses to cut the sheet materials.
The art is replete with dispensers with which lengths of sheet materials may be manually dispensed from supplies of the sheet materials (typically in helical rolls) that are carried on the dispensers, which dispensers include cutting members having sharp cutting edges adapted for transversely cutting dispensed lengths of the sheet materials from the supply of sheet materials remaining on the dispensers. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,567,557, and 4,915,768 provide illustrative examples. The cutting members on some of those dispensers provide a potential source of injury for persons using the dispensers, particularly if the cutting members have sharp teeth such as those on a cutting blade described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,913,767 that is adapted to cut folded polymeric sheet material. A guard described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,989,769 has been devised for such a cutting member, however, such guards can be removed by workmen that are less concerned with safety than with the ease of using the dispenser. Other such dispensers including means for protecting users of the dispensers from contact with the sharp cutting edges between their uses to cut the sheet materials are described in GB 2 173 141 A (A. E. Brown) dated Oct. 8, 1986; Patent Abstracts of Japan, vol. 010, no. 070 (M-462), dated Mar. 19, 1986, and JP 60 213661 A (Kouzaburou Hiuga), dated Oct. 25, 1985; and GB 2 196 285 A (S. Urushizaki) dated Apr. 27, 1988.
The present invention provides means useful on portable dispensers for transversely cutting dispensed lengths of sheet materials from supplies of the sheet materials carried on the dispensers, which means for transversely cutting protects a user of one of the dispensers from a cutting member on the dispenser between its uses to cut sheet material, while providing easy efficient severing of the sheet materials when that is desired.
According to the present invention there is provided a portable dispenser from which sheet material may be manually dispensed from a helically wound roll of the sheet material carried on the dispenser. A frame of the dispenser includes frame members defining a passageway through which sheet material being dispensed from the roll of sheet material can be pulled, which frame members include a first frame member having a guide surface generally parallel to an axis about which the sheet material is mounted for rotation. The dispenser includes a cutting member having a sharp cutting edge adapted for transversely cutting the sheet material. That cutting member also has an elongate contact surface generally parallel to and spaced from the cutting edge. The cutting member is mounted on the frame for pivotal movement relative to the frame about a cutting member pivot axis generally parallel to the sheet material axis, spaced from the guide surface of the frame, and generally parallel to and spaced from both the contact surface and the cutting edge of the cutting member. That pivotal movement is between:
a) a retracted position (to which the cutting member is biased) at which the cutting edge is spaced from the passageway and is positioned to restrict contact between a person using the dispenser and the cutting edge, and at which retracted position the contact surface of the cutting member projects away from the dispenser at a position spaced away from the first side of the passageway so that the sheet material will normally not contact it as the sheet material is puled from the dispenser and the sheet material must be tensioned in an arcuate path around the contact surface of the fame and the contact surface of the cutting member to move the cutting member, and
b) a cutting position to which the cutting member can be moved from its retracted position by manually tensioning sheet material being pulled from the dispenser in an arcuate path around the guide surface of the frame and the contact surface of the cutting member, at which cutting position the cutting edge is positioned to transversely sever the sheet material tensioned between the guide surface of the frame and the contact surface of the cutting member.
The cutting member can have first and second portions with joined edges and with the cutting member pivot axis generally along their joined edges; the cutting edge being along the edge of its first portion opposite its second portion, and the contact surface being along the edge of its second portion opposite its first portion, and the cutting member being mounted on the first frame member with its cutting edge positioned along that first frame member and projecting toward the guide surface of the frame. The first and second portions of the cutting member can be disposed to provide a generally L-shaped cross section or can be disposed generally on opposite sides of the cutting member pivot axis.